St. Paul's Church - Nanjing, China - May 13th, 2012

Today was the day I would be seeing much more of the Christian community that makes up Nanjing. The church was St. Paul's Church, an Anglican Church founded in 1923. When I arrived it was crowded as in the main Chapel a wedding was being prepared for. It was a bit overwhelming because of all the people...I then got a call from my friend who let me know where the English service was, which was in a smaller but more spacious, less crowded area in a different building. 

The theme of the service was the love of God. As the program said at the beginning, "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you." 

When I arrived it had just begun so I caught the scripture reading and Apostles Creed before the hymn and then sermon. 

The first thing I noticed was how humble the place was. There was a single wooden cross in front of red drapes and the altar where the people would go to speak. The second thing I noticed was the music. Those old English hymns when sung by a good choir are some of the most heavenly things in the world. That was a major good that I experienced today, was the beauty of those hymns. 

The sermon was from a brother of the church. He was quite passionate and talked about how love of Jesus means claiming souls. This line reminded me of how Christianity and Islam are the most aggressive religions historically when it comes to gaining converts (through peaceful and military means). For a while a lot of it was good and I thought he was describing virtue really well (carrying for the sick and for others, as well as loyalty to friends), and then he went off on a tangent. He brought gay marriage into it and seemed to be saying two things:

1) Those who believe in Gay Marriage are moral relativists and that "The world is" (which isn't not always true). 

2) That there are false prophets in the Church who support gay marriage. 

His words reminded me of how unwelcome the Church can be to people and how the love isn't unconditional, but conditional. The ironic thing in it was that some interpretations of Jonathan's relationship to David was in fact homosexual and that was what he was using to illustrate how we should love and be loyal to God (unlike Saul who used David for his vanities). 

Besides the end of the sermon/tangent, it was a really enjoyable service. It was great being there with my friend I'd made last week. Afterwords I joined him and his friends for Lunch and their had a discussion with one of them in regards to Christianity versus philosophy in what should be valued. Both of us believed in truth and virtue the difference was I doubted the Bible and Christ as God (Christ can be a great example for how to live I think, just like Lao Tzu and the other great men), but I do think admitting ones own flaws and being honest about it is the only way to move forward and to grow as a person (or for a peoples to grow). 

Where we differed most was I believe our relationships to others and our own actions are the most important thing that we know (living virtuously and growing), as well as the quest for truth. He believed that the truth came down from Jesus and that humanity is so broken that only belief saves us (via reward in the afterlife due to Jesus's sacrifice on the cross). 

He brought up the C.S. Lewis Trilemma of Jesus being "Lunatic, Liar or Lord," as proof of Jesus's divinity, which for me didn't quite do it. There have been many throughout history who were delusional on some things but still super smart and ethical on others. He was flawed and human like them. What makes him different? 

He's a kinesthetic learner and all about experience. His experiences with people who are believers and through church and relationship made him who he is. For me that's true as well, but so much of my experience of learning is through books, hearing, introspection and that was when we realized how our ways of learning compliment one another. 

I told him I'd pray to Jesus and see what happens. Though I don't know if that's the best way to check the validity of Christianity (check it's claims) in regards to greater truths or the revelation it claims to be. Historically a lot of it doesn't hold up literally (Exodus, Genesis, Noah's Ark), but that doesn't change the value of the stories (though their are some un-virtuous practices in the Bible done in God's name). 

It was a great day and it reminds me why I do the blog. It's about the human relationships and the quest for truth...it's the discussions and the learning that comes through discussion, study and experience.

The Problem of Evil - Return to St. Paul's Church - Nanjing, China - July 1st, 2012

Today has been an interesting day. I've met with friends and talked philosophy and teaching in China, ran into a philosopher from Kentucky who is teaching math and physics here and experienced an interesting sermon. 

I figured with the time I have left in Nanjing I should revist St. Paul, and also visit the Temple before I go. Both are interesting places from what I experienced before, and in the case of Daming Temple, heard about. 

The sermon today touched on the Problem of Evil, and to a degree the nature of belief and faith. 

First I arrived early and sung two of the songs with the congregation, while also catching up with Durin, a college student who I had met there last time I had visited. After that there was the songs and readings, all which focused on the reality of God being there and the desire for God, before leading up to the sermon. 

The readings were a psalm, and a chapter in Mark in which Jesus heals a woman who is healed by her faith in him, and his healing of a dead twelve year old girl. 

The sermon started with the pastor telling a story about a sixteen year old believer he knew who died of cancer. He mentioned how he didn't know why events like this happen if God heals and that it had initially caused him to doubt. He eventually came back and tied this story to the story of a missionary in the 19th Century whose daughters had died in a shipwreck, and when he had passed the shipwreck on the way to his wife how his belief in God had caused him to have peace in his soul. 

"What is the state of your soul?" He asked the congregation. 

My thoughts were...'I don't know if I have one...I really have no way of proving if it exists or not. Where is the soul? What is the soul?'

He ended with making a claim that God seeks those who trust and have faith in him, like the woman who had faith and healed and the young girl who had been dead. If Jesus is "The Way, the Truth and the Light," my experience of the relationship has been an unknown, much like the existence of my soul, except Jesus's stories remind us of the importance of integrity with the world and living with truth and honesty in all that we do.

That is something I do believe in. virtue and integrity, it may be hard to fully define but it is something that can be defined and experienced without the questions and unknown. If Jesus Christ is God, I'll always be open to knowing that, but right now Jesus is unknown as anyone else in the past where I can know how others thought of him and what others believed him to be, but if I believed that without any doubts...I'd be lying to myself and that would not be living with virtue or integrity.

Nanjing International Christian Fellowship - Nanjing, China - April 15th, 2012

Today was my first day visiting a Christian community in China and my first Christian faith visit this year. What an experience it was.

I went with my friend that I made here in China recently who is a Christian and together we went to go check it out.

The Nanjing International Christian Fellowship (NICF) services take place on the 5th floor of a hotel. The room is quite big with many white seats. The stage is red with lights with NICF in white letters. To the right and left of the stage where the band is set up (surrounded greenery) there are two projectors. You need a foreign passport to attend due to regulations by the local government.

The congregation was extremely diverse. With people from all over Africa (including the lead singer and the reverend), the UK (another singer), America, Singapore and many other areas.

The service began like many an evangelical service I've attended in the States. It had the Christian rock feel was concert-like. The songs that were played were "We Gather to Worship" (the main opening worship hymn I've heard at modern evangelical churches) and "Trust and Obey" which kind of rubbed me the wrong way...but that's to be expected given my agnosticism I tend to have.

After that the Reverend spoke on his sermon about faithfulness. He said that by being obedient to God we are rewarded but faithfulness is needed too. He was funny in some of the comments he made:

"God is wants us to be diamonds for faithful people are rare and like diamonds. Most stores don't actually sell real diamonds, it's glass. So husbands by your wife a gold ring."

"In the old days men used to pay a bridal fee, so there wife had to be obedient cause they owned her. It is not that way nowadays so much (implying it's a good things it's changed). But God owns us."

These were some of his humorous if at time off color comments. He was good at quoting scripture and was a pretty classy guy (he was dressed in a suit). Besides the things I've written about before on how my own morals differ from Conservative Christianity, I do think he had some good points, especially on how faithfulness in friends and others should be valued. He was also big on forgiveness (he mentioned a preacher caught with a prostitute who came back...I wondered if he would feel the same about anyone else though who wasn't coming form a place of power and had made a mistake).

Because of this I felt much more connected talking to my friend afterword about the service and religion as a whole. She made me realize how much I still wrestle with it in having belief or no and I realized I may be doing that for the rest of my life (which I don't mind...I usually discover so much and it does mean I might find the truth eventually too).

The music wasn't really my thing since I find reflective music like chants or hymns are where I feel the most aware of how far I've come and still have to go. Celebration music has it's place...but when I'm thinking about God in that sort of environment, it tends to make me sort of disconnected since in the jubilation short term gratification through joy can takeover the mind versus the wholeness of what it means to be human, flawed and hopefully growing that can come from a more quite traditional environment...where things are allowed to the surface and with it the choice of what to do with it next.

Xuanmiao Guan - Suzhou, China - April 1st, 2012

This entry was hard to write. I've never been at a place where I've felt such a mixture of emotions (except perhaps when I visited the Vatican). I think the best way to tackle it is how I first met the Temple.

At the gate there is a building that was part of the Temple complex but now serves as a high end place for people to buy gold (blessed by Taoist monks, yep). Outside the Temple gates (and within I would soon learn) are shops and more shops. Clothes, high end tea, figurines and even things with naked women on them that look like they came out of a trailer park. These shops and more surround the Temple and are spread throughout the Temple grounds.

Once we passed through the gate we were greeted by a swarm of shoppers who were visiting the different craftsmen and sellers that covered the grounds of the sides of the Temple. Wanting to get out of the noise and feeling of emptiness I made for the main building of the Temple which was separated by a small gate.

Once inside I was greeted by a throng of people who sat watching a Taoist service taking place. The music was peaceful, the chanting was order to the chaos outside. Inside the Temple three Golden Immortals rose up where offerings were placed. The monks were dressed in colorful robes and around was a guardian for each birth year on the Chinese Zodiac.

The people were mid-age (a few 20ish) but mostly older married couples. You could see that they were experiencing something in the ritual and peace that the main hall brought. Even as a tourist site, it hadn't completely gone to the dogs. It was still an active temple and for all the people there it meant something.

Of the things that stood out in the main hall, there was a one horned bull that was rubbed on the head and snout for luck, an immortal who was most likely Guan Yin of Buddhist lore who was in three corners of the Temple. There also was a bridge placed in the middle of the hall painted black and gold.

After we crossed through to the back we found a hall with tacky lights around a God or Immortal of War, the room was nearly empty, and then in the main hall the three Gods of Long life. We crossed through the hall and ended up back with the shops. The shops were impossible to get away from, except in the Temple rooms.

The last thing we saw were the God of Literature. The fact that one exists made me smile a bit inside. It's nice to know that something like that has been admired for thousands of years. It was outside this temple where in the shop that was selling Gods, porn on plates and stuff was also being sold.

This place made me feel peace and want to wretch. Peace because of the people there worshiping and the times I myself prayed and other wretch because of how close money as God was present...it was hard to tell where the good of religion and worship of money began as they overlapped in a messed up ball of humanity...

The Northern Temple Pagoda (Beisi Ta) - Suzhou, China - March 31st, 2012

One of the first things I noticed about the Temples in Suzhou (and most of the things in Suzhou) is that many of the sites that people can visit are cheap or free. The North Temple Pagoda (Beisi Ta in Chinese) is one of the places that nearly anyone regardless of income would be able to visit, especially compared to the Temple prices in most of the big cities like Nanjing, Shanghai and Hangzhou.

At the gate were tourist busses (every major site has them) and people selling their wares, as well as some old beggars at the gate. To get there Randy and I had walked for nearly an hour from the Humble Administrator's Garden.

At the entrance of the Temple just past the gate is a giant fat laughing Buddha sitting down behind a large stone altar. The Buddha is made of stone and his face and form is such a joyful way to be greeted in such a place as this.

The Temple itself isn't all that large for being a tourist site, which really leaves so much of it's charm and holiness of the place. In the center of the grounds rises the 9 story Pagoda (was once 11). In the middle of the Pagoda is Guan Yin draped in a red cape. The darkness adds peacefulness to the place and the narrow passageway to her is like a baby's entrance to and from the womb. I did the three bows as the other folks who passed through were doing and noticed an old couple whose seemed the most present in the act of worship (compared to some of the younger folks and the few tour groups).

After that we climbed to the second floor before descending back down. It was good we didn't go farther up, the walls have no railings on the way down making it rather dangerous (combined with the small worn down steps). The Pagoda is ancient dating all the way back to the 3rd Century, and being rebuilt once more in 1582.

After exciting the Pagoda we entered the Temple grounds where incense was being burned by couples and individuals. It was here I bought some incense and burned it for my friend Hien who had died last year. Since her funeral I've been wanting to visit but have been unable to, so in China I've wanted to honor her here.

The Three Great Golden Buddhas rose up as I bowed three times towards them with the incense that was afire and then placed it upon the sand where the others stood. In China three is lucky number. Packs of incense are in three, every Temple usually has three figures at the back.

When I left my heart was full of remembrance and time felt as if it had slowed down as I left the grounds with Randy.

Garden Tombyard of Puhaddin - Yangzhou, China, March 11th, 2012

The last place of historical and religious significance we would visit was the Tombyard of Puhaddin. Beyond the peacefulness of the place, the thing that stood out was how well the place had been kept and the history of the relationship between China and Islam that was present.

The Tombyard is still used today for some worship services and because of it some areas are locked off from tourists...such as the prayer hall which I was able to catch a glimpse of through the small windows that covered the door of the hall.

The entrance to the Tombyard is a large gate which leads into a garden that's not feeling it's best. A lot of the grass and plants are dead and the water looks a bit malnourished, but there are still areas where it feels like a peaceful garden should...such as the hill top that leads the second gate where there are areas to sit and rest.

The second gate is like an entrance to any Temple where its a circular entrance, though the colors are not temple colors. The Tombyard itself is made up of greens and whites as the main color. One of the areas that stands out the most in the Tombyard is the Pagoda that was made where prayer is called. It is made in the style of Chinese architecture (the curved roof) though at the top is a moon, a symbol of Islam and where we were located. Right next to the Pagoda was a walkway honoring a general whom an Emperor had honored. We went up to the top of the Pagoda and were able to see the building housing some of the greater Tombs (Like Puhaddin's Tomb). The Tombyard is a mixture of Chinese and Arabic architecture which really gives it a feeling of history (beyond the ancient tombstones themselves). It is quite a lovely and peaceful and has so much information.

Beyond the second gate is where the gravestones are as well. The gravestones date all the way back to the Song Dynasty, and in the room across from the tombs are coal copies of Yuan Dynasty era tombstones with translations of what had been inscribed in Arabic. Each room has its purpose listed, as well as when it was built and its importance to the Muslim community in Yangzhou.

The area had so much history present. Both of the warriors honored in the Tomb and those the Chinese Lords had chosen to honor like Puhaddin who was a teacher in Yangzhou. Most of the people honored were warriors and merchants from the Song all the way to the Qing Dynasty.

While we were there a small tour group was being lead through all the areas of the Tombyard. Historically China has never been at odds with Islam even though Chinese and Muslim Empires had fought in the past, there isn't the same legacy of the crusades and conquest of Spain and the Ottoman conquest and because of it, there isn't the same bad blood between China and Islam as there is between Europe and Islam.

The area spoke of harmony between the two cultures and could be seen in a small way in the small tour group where the Muslim guide guided a more traditional looking Chinese family through the Tombyard telling of the rich history of this powerful place.

The House Taoist Temple - Yangzhou, China - March 11th, 2012

During the adventure around the Old District, Randy and I would stumble upon an old house that had been converted into a Temple. I can't remember the man who owned the house years ago, but the House Temple itself is what really stands out. I believe it was a Taoist Temple, which I will explain more later in the entry.

The Temple was very much a mixture of Taoism and Buddhism. Upon the wall of the entrance was the Taoist symbol of the Yin and Yang, as well as the colors of Taoism...being orange and yellow. Most of the statues were bearded and men as well, which leads me to believe if it wasn't an outright Taoist Temple than it was the main influence of the place. Usually the only bearded Buddhist Bodhisattvas that are seen are of the Three Kingdoms warrior Guan Yu or local honored heroes...which may have been a part of the Temple considering the overlap between Taoism and Mahayana Buddhism here in China. I think it is more likely to be a Temple to the Immortals though, since all the men had very long beards which is a Taoist Temple trait.

There was an area for candles and where incense could be placed where the incense had burned down (you'll find this in any Temple in China be it Taoist, Buddhist or Confucian)and there were only two buildings. The first with the bearded deity at the entrance and at the back a large building where there were three different deities, all bearded men.

The Temple was small and had no entrance fee...it really hit back the better part of religion in serving the common good and community. It was here I saw it being practiced when a middle aged women came with incense to honor one of the deities. The abbot or monk present (bearded, another reason for why it might have been a Taoist Temple, Buddhist Monks don't have facial hair). The monk was pretty impatient though when helping the woman which gave a bit of a bad vibe since so much of Taoism is balance (it's like seeing an angry Buddhist Monk, though Taoists are much more comfortable with emotions and the randomness of them in my reading of the texts (Tao Te Qing, Writings of Chuang Tzu). His actions towards her where in contrast to the place which had older folks walking through it who were at peace as outside people bought tourist items and food. It was like an Oasis in a desert and I don't think I'll forget the visit to that tiny Temple anytime soon.